The last hostage is found and brought home; a nation sighs in relief, but with abiding sadness

Israel from the Inside with Daniel Gordis · Jan 27, 2026 · 1m

The Israeli Hebrew press carried the news concerning the search for Ran Gvili in detail. In the non-Hebrew press, it could be challenging to get a sense of the scope of the operation—the massive intelligence efforts, a captured terrorist who gave critical information, the hundreds of soldiers, the gigantic digging equipment and the dozens of dentists who were brought in during the final days to go through more than 250 bodies in a mass Palestinian grave before Gvili was located and his identity confirmed.

“There are no hostages in Gaza” was what everyone said when it was announced that he’d…